


the touch of my mother

by millimallow



Series: the world of owa [27]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Original Work
Genre: Family Angst, Gen, Happy Ending, Life-affirming, just a nice story abt family and friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-03
Updated: 2019-04-03
Packaged: 2020-01-04 08:52:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18340295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/millimallow/pseuds/millimallow
Summary: i don't know if there's a day where i don't look a fool.





	the touch of my mother

east island is a quiet place.

my mother left me her business when she passed. a café serving fusion food to the sailors from u’baani and the plainslands who only had a short distance left before the larger, undeniably capital west island, but who could not obtain their favourite food and desserts that far to the west. we’re both only southern, sharing no mangrove blood, but her husband- my father- took regular business trips to the tropical coast. he came back with stories of exotic frozen desserts and rich, complex fish dishes he would insist my mother made for us. because he missed them too- just like the sailors do. and when we moved to be closer to his work, my mother founded a business in her home. she looked me in the eyes on that first night and told me- “make it with what you’re good at.”

it’s difficult to feel like you’re fulfilling someone’s wishes and betraying them at the same time. especially when you remember them like nothing has ever changed. i know the tone in which my mother lectured me on my behaviour and my academics, or even just my slouching, and i hear it every time i accidentally forgo one of the many fruitpeppers instrumental to the goat’s milk stew or take an hour to restock the traditional fridges in the back. _when the ice cream is your most popular dish_ , she’ll say to me, _that dilly-dallying can’t be forgiven_. even though she’s long dead. this isn’t really what i’m good at. sometimes i contemplate the reality that maybe i’m not good at anything in particular. that what i’m doing right now is just a compensation for that awful, awful fact. either way, i’m a disappointment to my mother. who worked so hard, so independently, to keep living in her new and alien home.

i won’t lie to you and say it’s not successful. i couldn’t count even with both my hands the amount of regulars who come here month after month, year after year, departing for a while off the boats which lug goods between the u’baani coast and the west island. some of them know my name and remark on how much i’ve grown, while i resist commenting on how their hair has greyed and eyes have aged over the years. just as well, i know their orders, even if i can’t make them as perfectly as my mother did. and we get new business too. nowadays, amongst the aging sea captains and small-time traders there are just as many young spitfires, beneficiants of the new trade in stones and minerals for magical programming use. can’t say i understand it, but they’re excited to see someone their age behind the counter. and when we look into each other’s eyes, there’s a new and common feeling between us:

 _what i’m doing is hard, and my understanding is sometimes lacking, but there’s a fire of survival and pride that i can never kill or let down_.

\---

these days, i’m experimenting. while both benefit from equal amounts of sunlight, the east island collects a greater amount of fresh-water streams and arable land than the three-pillar coast of origin for my customers. so an hour after a particularly heated argument with the supplier of my turtle meat packages, traditionally wound in palm leaves with bright red hemp string and delivered to my door in a cooler, i’m left sitting on a pepper crate outside the beachside venue and its sea-blue wooden walls contemplating how i’m going to make the next day’s sugar-flour sandwiches. and it hits me that half-an-hour’s walk away is the cattle farm with the girl i went to school with in that isolated little pier-house school complex. so with the sea breeze at my back and the sun high and waiting to set, i’m taking myself slowly down the sandy dirt path which leads inland, a place i’ve never really needed to go. and when i find that there’s nothing fresh available, i settle for the preserves and cuttings popular amongst the sailors who head south instead, away from the equator. and i pray to every deity i know that nobody’s afraid of cow’s meat.

\--

captain mall’ran has, for the last 20 years, kept his tradition of dragging his whole small crew into whatever venue he deigns most suitable for lunch. and he spends well, so i do my best to accommodate him even if the café may become crowded. and after everyone else has ordered, he comes to me personally at the counter. he grins wide, and i thank fate that i’ve had so long to get used to the fact that mangrove grins expose chalk-white and shining fangs every time lips move. and this is the moment i’ve been waiting for in anxiety all morning.

“one citrus-wash turtle sugarbread, please.” i remember the recipe like i remember the sun rising in the morning. fresh turtle meat dunked into a grand bath of acidic zests and fragrant vinegars, tenderizing and absorbing the herbs it’s flanked with by the liquid, placed squarely on a rectangular plank of dry and slightly-sweet sugarbread and dressed with a salty pepper sauce. but i can’t do it this morning.

“i’m sorry.” i say it, and his expression changes within an instant to one of disappointment and hesitation. “but the jackshit who supplies the turtle is holding out on me right now.”

“oh.”

“but you can try something from the east island if you’d like.” he’s clearly confused at the proposal. “i picked up some beef from the inland last night, and it’s been bathing in the same citrus wash. i’ve been expecting you.”

“young man, i don’t think i’ve ever had cow meat.”

“you’ll find it has a rich and strong flavour.” he takes pause, looks to the side, and then relinquishes.

“what the hell. slide it over to me like usual.”

-

i was able to sell turtle meat again, and it still gets taken. but every week i see captain mall’ran, and he orders the citrus-wash beef in the morning. one time he shakes my hand over it, and tells me my mother would be proud.

for the first time, i believe it when it’s said.


End file.
